The practice of solfeggios is useful to instrumentalists and to those who intend to become composers, but is detrimental to those who wish to become singers. In fact, by commencing with the study of solfeggios, we break the established rules for developing and preserving the voice.
The human voice must mot be considered as a complete instrument upon which every kind and style of music can be executed.
It is only when the voice is fully developed that it is able, without injury to itself, to sing with the syllables do, re, mi, fa, etc.; in other words, to begin the practice of solfeggios.
Pupils, by beginning in this manner, give all their attention to intonation, and none to the quality of tone, or the manner of producing it. Now the least movement of the mouth, the tongue, the cavities of the nose, the cheeks, or even the teeth, will alter the quality of the tone of voice.
For example : when we sing “do”, we place the tongue to the roof of the mouth. When we sing “re”, we lift the tongue. To sing “mi”, we close the mouth before giving the tone. To sing fa, we first obstruct the emission of the voice to pronounce the F. And for sol, la and si, we move the tongue in various directions.
On every one of these syllables, the pupil, following the natural effects of the vocal mechanism, will alter the quality of tone, and contract faults , which afterward it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to rectify.
Thus people who have, before the change of voice, been accustomed to these movements of the tongue, find difficulty and sometime impossibility in the delivery of the higher tones, and the voice becomes false, weak and worthless.
The cause of this is evident. Pupils who practice solfeggios neglect the quality of the tone. Some open the mouth too wide, others not wide enough ; some sing through the nose, others in the throat, etc.
These few line will suffice to demonstrate that this manner of teaching the elements of singing before the change of voice has taken place, is the real cause of the loss of so many voices, of their bad quality and the weakness of the breathing organs.
In learning properly to deliver the voice and to vocalise on the vowel a (ah), instead of using the syllables do, re, etc., it is the ear which will lead pupils, not the notes. The vocal organs will, therefore, assume from the beginning the most natural position for singing, without the pupil bestowing special attention to it.
Convinced that teaching the elements should be summed up in a few clear and concise principles, easily understood, I offer in the following pages a preparatory method of singing, to those who would avoid the evils of commencing with the solfeggios.